How Can I Quickly Preserve All These White Peaches?

Here's a personal request from me to you. What should I do with all these marvelous late-season peaches? They were a gift but I am afraid I won't be able to use them all before they turn to mush.

These are white peaches, which are much more delicate and less acidic in flavor than the earlier yellow peaches. They have very little acidity, so they don't work as well in pies or other baked desserts; they need some lemon juice or another addition to bring up the acidity and flavor.

I am in the middle of a busy week so I know there won't be any canning or intensive preserving going on. But I love peaches and am so excited to have a few pounds to play with at the end of the summer, and I don't want to waste them.

Have you ever quickly preserved or cooked with a few pounds of peaches? Any ideas?

Peach recipes from The Kitchn:
• Individual Peach Ginger Hand Pies You Can Pack for Lunch
• Peach and Cornmeal Upside-Down Cake
• Fresh Peach Frozen Yogurt with Only Four Ingredients
• Recipe: Chunky Peach Pancake Topping
• Super-Quick Summer Dessert: Peach and Biscuit Crostata
• Peach Cookies from Cafe Chocolada
• Recipe: Peach and Thyme Polenta Tart

(Image: Faith Durand)

Comments (18)

Can you cut them up and flash freeze them (single layer on a baking sheet) for later use?

If you don't have time for a small batch of preserves then flash freezing, for later use, or pureeing and freezing would be your best bets. I use white peach puree all the time in chocolate fillings, as well as to flavor cakes or desserts or make ice cream or sorbet, the puree is kept in the freezer and lasts for 3 to 4 months easily.

Alton brown did a great show on freezing peaches... here is a link to the transcript:

http://goodeatsfanpage.com/Season10/peaches/peachy_keen_tran.htm

See "Scene 16" for the details, but basically he covers them with sugar and an acid to stop them from browning and to create a syrup. Then Freezes them.

He even follows with some awesome looking ways to use them. I hope this helps!

Lucky you!

I like peach chutney, although there are only so many jars you'd need...

- Amelia of Gradually Greener

I follow on the suggestions to flash-freeze pieces or puree. You can always take them out later if you want to preserve them another way. You can also stew them and then freeze that delicious stewedness.

I did a batch of peach chutney and froze it in small portions. Most of them will become Christmas gifts. I used this recipe, though you'll want to read the reviews because my first batch was rather sweet, though it's the kind of thing where the flavor improved the longer it sat.

I also made spiced peaches for a brunch recently and man oh man was that good!

@fib,

That good-eats episode is what popped into my mind as soon as I read the post.

PS - never new such a transcript site existed, thanks!

I know you don't have time to can, but preserves can be refrigerated or frozen. I heartily recommend a peach ginger preserves recipe I found on the internet - 6 cups peaches, 3 tablespoons fresh ground ginger, 2 teaspoons lemon juice, 2-3 cups sugar to taste. Simmer for half an hour or so.

Seriously, you won't regret it, it's the best jam I've ever had.

I always freeze my peaches by removing the peel, slicing, covering with a citric acid product like fruit fresh desired amount of sugar. Then let them stand awhile at room temperature to let them juice up. I always put a weight (like a few plates) on top to keep them submerged in juice.

They're wonderful to pull out on winter's days!

Drop 'em in a pot of hot simple syrup and cook for a few minutes. Then throw them (plus simple syrup) into a mason jar and keep them in the fridge for as long a you like. We do this to a lot of different fruit and we each have one after dinner for dessert. I've also added rum, cinnamon and even a vanilla bean to the simple syrup. The extra flavor adds a little surprise.

Molly Wizenberg has a lovely recipe for chilled peaches in white wine. I'm sure white peaches would work nicely. I'm sure you wouldn't want to do all of your peaches this way, but it makes for a light dessert!

Ditto the above: freeze them. I have several bags of frozen peach halves in the freezer just waiting for this winter. I remove the stone and put the halves,with the skins, on a cookie sheet to harden and then into zip-lock bags. When it comes time to use the halves, a little warm water pops off the skin in one sheet. I use the thawed halves as lunch fruit with cottage cheese or yogurt. Oh, yum.

Glad to help jdmitch - the transcript site is awesome, and really captures Brown's recipes much better than the what gets posted on the food network's website.

FWIW, the method Merry123 describes is detailed on the site with helpful measurements at the link I provided.

Have a half a bushel frozen in quarters, same method as Iona above (I think). I just cut them up after washing and single layer freeze then transferred to ziplock bags. Looking forward to cobbler, smoothies and peachy chutney, marmalade etc. when I have time and want some local, summery wonder in winter.

If you can afford the time for some baking... I used this recipe from a favorite food blog recently, and it was AMAZING: http://phillyfoodie.com/post/184157777/peach-upside-down-cake.

I have a feeling the acidity level wouldn't matter, as I made a second one with pears, with an equally thrilling result. FYI, I decreased the sugar by about 25% the first time I made it, because I ran out of sugar, and actually preferred it over the sweeter cake that resulted the second time, when I I made it with the full amount of called-for sugar. But that's just my opinion.

Freeze them for a later session making bourbon-vanilla peach jam. Best thing in the world.